3 Dec 2022
An amazing survivor at 458 High Street Prahran; a simple weatherboard shop/house, it might be as late as 1890s, or judging by the multi-pane windows on the front and sides, as early as the 1850s. It’s heritage listed by the @stonningtoncitycouncil, but no date of construction is noted. The earliest newspaper reference I could find was 1899, when James Bullock the grocer died there. Later references imply it was a house rather than a shop, but could have been both, and apparently it had a verandah in 1899. There’s a big brick stable behind that’s now offices and actually bigger than the front part. It’s a pretty uncommon kind of building for Melbourne, where two storey timber shops are rare, and designed like a big stable rarer still (I don’t know of any others). Found a photo from 2010 when it was a much nicer colour, and had old doors too. It was Graham Geddes antiques back then. Update : a relative of Janes Bullock tells me that they were definitely there in 1879, and may have built it, probably a bit earlier than that.
Storey of Melbourne 
The building was both a home and Grocery shop. My wife’s Grandmother was born there in 1890 and grew up in the building, her brother Frederick (F.T. Bullock) was born there in 1879. It was Phoenix Antiques for many years. A photo on the dust jacket of Antique Furniture in Australia by Anthony Hall, has a picture of myself and my son, the great Grandson of the original owner outside the building in 1995.
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So your wife’s great-grandparents were there in the 1870s by the sound of it. Any idea if they built it, or it was there long before them ?
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her brother Frederick (F.T. Bullock) was born there upstairs in 1879 His parents married in 1878 and were there then but I’m not sure when it was built, (definitely by 1879).
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Yes, I have been told
James built it
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Ok they must have been youngish in 1879, so if they built it, must have been the 1870s, not the 1850s.
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James was born in Prahran in 1854, his father Thomas was also a grocer, I think it was his store originally before he moved to Dandenong. The 1854 date would ring true for the design of the building.
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